PC freezes only during games

[Fietsbel88]

Hello everyone,

My excuses for any grammatical errors, english is not my native language.

A few days ago my system (specs in profile) started to act up.
At first it would randomly freeze while playing video games.
It could take up to 5minutes or 2hours before my screen freezes and i was forced to do a hard manual reset.
When the screen freezes you can still hear the sound of the game being stuck.

Since yesterday the freezes appear to happen a lot faster, mostly after 1-10 minutes.

What i have done so far...

- cleaning pc from all dust
- reinstalling Windows + drivers
- try new and older gpu drivers
- Run Aida64 cpu + memory stress test for about 2-4 hours (no errors).
- Run Unengine becnmark valley + heaven multiple times (no freezes)


I have also monitored the CPU+GPU tempratures idle and under load but they remain the same as when i had the system build 2 years ago. nothing is overheating.

I seriously have no clue what i could possible do more and i am close to giving up and sending the system for repairs.

What do you guys think? i am afraid one or both my gpu's are failing.

Thanks in advance

 

[natr0n]

could be ram check timings perhaps,

try gaming with 1 card see what happens too

 

[Fietsbel88]

Hi natr0n,

Thanks for your quick reply.
I will check the ram timings when i get back home.
Although i have not changed anything about my ram, could there still be something wrong with it?
Its been running on the same xmp profile since i had the system.

Also, if there would be something wrong with the ram, would the aida64 memory test not suppost to show errors?

I have already tried gaming with crossfire disabled but i still get the errors.
But i guess you want me to unplug a card and try 1 at a time.

 

[natr0n]

Hi natr0n,

Thanks for your quick reply.
I will check the ram timings when i get back home.
Although i have not changed anything about my ram, could there still be something wrong with it?
Its been running on the same xmp profile since i had the system.

I have already tried gaming with crossfire disabled but i still get the errors.
But i guess you want me to unplug a card and try 1 at a time.

I usually manually set timings on ram, so that wouldn't hurt. I would try the 1 card plugged in at a time 1st if that doesnt work do the manually timings.

another thing is disable radeonsettings.exe from starting that causes conflicts with afterburner if you use it. meaning crashes as you are having

 

[Fietsbel88]

I am not using afterburner, but i will try with only 1 gpu plugged when i get home.
Will post results then.

if anyone else has more suggestions in the meanwhile feel free!

 

[Ebo]

Have you tried to run your system with only 1 GFX in ?.

 

[Fietsbel88]

Hi Ebo,

Will try that tonight when i get home from work and post results.

 

[Ferrum Master]

Do some intel burn test filling all your ram for few runs.

 

[Caring1]

Run GPU-z and post a screenshot of the clocks and sensors tab open, that may help us.

 

[Fietsbel88]

Back home now, pictures below... (first one with GPU1, 2nd with GPU2)

 

[Caring1]

I wonder if the GPU's have the low idle clock bug that affects power states.
I don't usually suggest flashing cards, but higher clocks generally fixes the issue, the downside is your cards use more power.

 

[Vayra86]

Looking at that GPU usage on GPU1, I would suggest removing the GPU devices in Windows device manager, reseating both cards (check PCIE slots and the card itself for dust, blow them out if you have compressed air around), uninstalling the display drivers entirely and clean install the most recent one.

Even if that won't help it will narrow down the issue. You can also try swapping the cards around in the slots, and see if the behaviour changes - it can be a good way to see if this is hard- or software related. If it's just the GPU1 slot that is spotty like that, regardless of which card is in it, you know your GPU's are fine. But do that clean install first.

Greetings from NL ^^

 

[Fietsbel88]

Tested my ram with memtest86 last night and let it run for 2 full runs.
It showed no errors.

I guess i can assume that my ram is OK?

 

[Fietsbel88]

Looking at that GPU usage on GPU1, I would suggest removing the GPU devices in Windows device manager, reseating both cards (check PCIE slots and the card itself for dust, blow them out if you have compressed air around), uninstalling the display drivers entirely and clean install the most recent one.

Even if that won't help it will narrow down the issue. You can also try swapping the cards around in the slots, and see if the behaviour changes - it can be a good way to see if this is hard- or software related. If it's just the GPU1 slot that is spotty like that, regardless of which card is in it, you know your GPU's are fine. But do that clean install first.

Greetings from NL ^^

Hi Vayra,

Thanks for the suggestion.
Will definitely try this tonight, hopefully i can at least narrow down the issue.

I wonder though, if one or both my gpu's are failing why aint my system freezing during gpu benchmarks like valley or heaven? should not this mean that it is something else but the gpu?

 

[Vayra86]

Hi Vayra,

Thanks for the suggestion.
Will definitely try this tonight, hopefully i can at least narrow down the issue.

I wonder though, if one or both my gpu's are failing why aint my system freezing during gpu benchmarks like valley or heaven? should not this mean that it is something else but the gpu?

If it is a power supply issue, the combined load of CPU+GPU can cause system freezing in games but not in benchmarks that typically have (very) low CPU loads. However, power supply issues generally show as 'hard power down' to protect system components. Freezes can be anything - I've had system freezes due to a bad SATA cable (!) as well. I doubt one of your GPU's is failing, I rather think that this is a driver related issue - I have also experienced system hangs/freezes with past driver versions. So there is a good chance that this solution is an easy fix, and it's always good to start simple.

If your system has been running fine, it is unlikely an issue of faulty RAM, this hardly ever happens out of the blue, but it can happen after power outages and the like.

EDIT: noticed you run an AMD setup not Nv ^^

 

[Fietsbel88]

Hi Vayra,



Thanks for your quick reply.

My cards are from amd/sapphire and i have installed the latest crimson driver yesterday but the problem remains.



Tonight i will follow your advise and reseat/swap the gpu’s and blow out the sockets.

Then uninstall the drivers with DDU and re-install the latest again.



Will post results after.

 

[Fietsbel88]

Alrite so i have done some card swapping after blowing out the pci-e slots.

Both cards instantly crash when finish loading into the game world of warcraft while in the first pci-e slot.
The original ''top card'' is now placed is the bottom slot where the ''bottom card'' used to be in.

Been playing for 10minutes now... still waiting for it to crash.

Could it be my top pci-e slot is borked?

edit: placed the same card back into the top pci-e slot, and started up the game.
it goes fine with the lowered ingame video settings which i changed for running with 1 card, but whenever i max the settings out just as i did for running with 2 cards the pc freezes within 5seconds.

so then i tried the bottom slot again with this same card and the max settings and everything is fine.

i am really thinking my top slot is broken...

suggestions?

 

[wolar]

It may be broken but i would do some more testing on different games and on the HDD, also check the cables(although it seems you did already).

Edit: Are you sure software wise everything is perfect ? Also try updating bios mobo, SSD and GPU.
Goodluck.